The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Dear Coaches and Contestants:
Lake Mary Preparatory School
The Griffin Speech and Debate Team invites you to attend the 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational.
This year’s tournament will be held on Saturday, April 5, 2014 at Lake Mary Preparatory School. We
continue to aim to offer a tournament uniquely designed to enhance the novice experience.
Thus, the Griffin Growl offers the following categories of competition:
 Lincoln Douglas Debate
 Radio Speaking
 Public Forum Debate
 Impromptu Speaking
 Student Congress
 Original Oratory
 Extemporaneous Speaking
 Declamation
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Oral Interp (Poetry)
Oral Interp (Prose)
Duo Interpretation
Dramatic Performance
There will be four preliminary rounds of competition in all events. In events with 12 or more entries, break
rounds will be offered.
Dr. Alexandra Sencer will act as tournament director with the assistance of Ms. Evonne Wang. If you have
any questions, please email us at [email protected]. If your concern is urgent, please contact Dr.
Alexandra Sencer by phone at (561) 313-1443.
Best of luck,
Dr. Alexandra Sencer
Director of Forensics
Griffin Growl Tab Director
Lake Mary Preparatory School
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
EVENTS AND POLICIES
This is a novice ONLY tournament. Students shall be considered a novice if they are in their first
year of forensics competition or they competed in two tournaments or less during the previous
academic year. Any student who does not fit these requirements is ineligible for competition.
Double entry will be allowed in all events but Lincoln Douglas, Public Forum and Student Congress
Debate. All events will feature four rounds of preliminary competition, and in events with 12
students or more, a minimum of a final round will be offered.
EVENT LIMITS
While Lake Mary Preparatory School is very proud to be hosting this tournament, we are small in
physical size. Thus, to start, each school will be allowed four entries in each debate event, six entries
in each speech event, and six entries in Student Congress. However, we will have a waitlist. Please
feel free to enter as many students on the waitlist as you would like. Students will be removed from
the waitlist as is deemed appropriate by the tab directors. All students will know whether they may
compete no later than 7:00 pm on Friday, March 28, 2014. Every possible accommodation will be
attempted for those who would like to participate, but not at the cost of providing quality
competition.
Lincoln Douglas Debate:
The resolution will be the March-April National Forensics League topic. Debaters will have four
minutes of prep time. Rounds 3 and 4 will be powered. Tiebreaks will be used in the following
order: (1) win-loss record, (2) opposition win-loss, (3) high/low speaks, and then (4) total speaks.
The top two teams will advance to the final round. The final round shall consist of a three-judge
panel. If possible, additional break rounds will be provided.
Public Forum Debate:
The topic will be the April NFL topic. However, the tournament will follow CFL guidelines. There
will be no coin-toss. Debaters will have two minutes of prep time. Rounds 3 and 4 will be powered.
Tiebreaks will be used in the following order: (1) win-loss record, (2) opposition win-loss, (3)
high/low speaks, and then (4) total speaks. The top two teams will advance to the final round. The
final round shall consist of a three-judge panel. If possible, additional break rounds will be provided.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
Congressional Debate:
Chambers will be comprised of no more than 28 students. In order to encourage novice competitors
to present well thought out and researched arguments, legislation will be released two weeks prior to
the competition. In order to provide this extended preparation time, all preliminary and break round
legislation will be written by tournament staff. Students will have the opportunity to set their own
agenda within chambers.
There will be two preliminary sessions of Congressional Debate. A parliamentarian will be assigned
to each chamber for the duration of preliminary competition. A Scorer A and a Scorer B will be
assigned to each chamber for each session. Eight students out of each chamber will advance. Scorer
A and Scorer B shall rank their Top 8. Scorer A’s 1st choice shall automatically advance to the final
round. Then Scorer A’s 2nd and 3rd place rankings shall be combined with the top three unique
names on Scorer B’s ballot to create a slate of five names. These names shall be written on the board
in alphabetical order. The students will rank the five names listed and the top two will advance to
the final round based off of preferential balloting. The same process shall take place for session two.
A do-not-nominate list will be provided to the judges. At the end of both sessions the
parliamentarian will rank all the students in the room. The final two contestants moving into the
final round will have the highest ranked competitors on the parliamentarian’s ballot tat have not yet
advanced.
Final Round Rules and Legislation will be released one week prior to the start of the
tournament.
Speech Events:
This year’s tournament shall offer Declamation, Original Oratory, Extemporaneous Speaking,
Impromptu, Dramatic Performance, Duo Performance, Oral Interpretation of Prose, Oral
Interpretation of Poetry and Radio Speaking. Individual events will follow National Catholic
Forensic League rules and guidelines with a few exceptions. We will use NCFL requirements for all
published materials in IEs. The grace period will be 30 seconds for all speech events. Any IE
participant who exceeds the grace period may not receive a rank of 1 in the round; any further
penalty will be at the discretion of the judge. A participant may only be penalized for a time violation
if the judge has used a precise timing device and notes penalty on the ballot.
Students competing in the wrong competition room will receive the last place rank in the round they
competed in. The other students in the room will have their scores adjusted upwards to correct for
the student who went to the wrong room. The top six competitors in each event will break to a final
round of competition in events with 12 or more competitors. The final round is a clean slate.
Students will place based on their final round performance. There shall be only one judge per
preliminary room of competition and a three-judge panel for the final round.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
EXTEMPORANEOUS SPEAKING:
All rounds of extemporaneous speaking will feature cross-examination in accordance with
NFL rules. The number of participants in the preliminary competition rooms will be adjusted
accordingly to allow for the running of a smooth tournament. Extemp topic areas shall be the
Africa and the Middle East, Latin America, Domestic Economics, U.S. Politics, and U.S.
Foreign Policy (Asian Focus).
IMPROMPTU SPEAKING:
In Impromptu, each contestant is allowed to draw three potential topics and they shall choose one
on which to speak. Timing begins when the contestant selects his/her topic. Contestants have a
TOTAL of 5 minutes in which to both prepare and speak. For example, a contestant may choose to
prepare for 2 minutes and then speak for up to 3 minutes, or prepare for 3 minutes and speak for
(then) up to 2 minutes. There is a 30 second grace period, after which the speaker may not be placed
first in the round. Judging is based on a creative approach to the topic, organization and fluency of
delivery. Topic areas for the speeches change each round. Time spent in speaking is valued over
preparation time. Impromptu topic areas shall be famous women leaders, Broadway,
Shakespeare, presidential puns, and civil rights leaders.
RADIO BROADCASTING:
For Radio Broadcasting, each contestant is allowed 20 minutes to prepare a 3-minute radio
broadcast, which must include at least one commercial break. Contestants are presented a packet of
new stories, which they must edit, during their preparation time, into a cohesive 3-minute “news
break.” The subject area of the commercial will be included in the packet. Students will deliver the
speech from BEHIND a judge and will be evaluated on the content balance of the news stories,
organization, delivery and creativity involving the commercial. High value is placed on ending the
broadcast at exactly three minutes. Deductions are made for time under or over, but not grace
period/penalties apply.
ALL rules are subject to change.
The tournament will make you aware of any changes at registration.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
THE GOLDEN GOBLET OF GROWTH will be awarded to new members of the forensics
community who have demonstrated the desire to dedicate themselves to the forensics community.
This award may be given to an individual in their first 1-3 years of coaching (new assistant coaches
count), new parents who have demonstrated outstanding dedication to forensics, or philanthropists
who have generously given back to the forensics community. There are many individuals in our
community who have just begun their careers of giving their time and efforts to transform students’
lives. The Griffin Growl will recognize individuals every year with this award. To nominate an
individual for this award, please email Alexandra Sencer-Vigars at [email protected] with
the subject “Dedicated Service to Forensics Award” and include the nominee’s:
Name
Email Address
Phone Number
An explanation of their dedication to forensics and why they deserve the award.
Past Winners:
2011 Mr. Bo Lint
2012 Ms. Julie Love
2012 Ms. Kelli Mitchell
2013 Ms. Zahra Syed
Lake Highland Preparatory School
Paul J. Hagerty High School
Wekiva High School
Lake Mary Preparatory School
JUDGING REQUIREMENTS:
Teams should bring one qualified judge for every two (2) debate entries. Debate judges will be
expected to judge both Lincoln Douglas and Public Forum Debate. Teams should bring one
qualified judge for every five (5) speech entries, rounded up in the case of fractional obligations.
Teams with Congress entries must bring 1 Congress judge. Judges shall not be released until all find
round ballots are distributed.
Keep in mind that a “qualified judge” understands the activity, speaks English, and is either
experienced sitting in the back of the room with a ballot or a flow pad as the case may be, or else has
been carefully trained by the team he or she is accompanying. A qualified judge knows how to assign
ranks or wins/losses, speaker points, and knows how to fill out a ballot. If you need some
instructional materials in advance for your lay judges, feel free to contact us and we will provide you
will some great sources. Additionally, we will ask that you rank each judge entry by level of
experience. This will help us provide the best experience possible for the students.
We are also committed to hiring-and using! - A quality pool of judges across divisions. To aid us in
that effort, the registration system will ask you explicitly request judge hires. Please request early; we
will not harm the quality of our tournament by oversubscribing hired judging as certain other
tournaments do. The cost of a hired judge is $40.00.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
JUDGES:
Seniors with a minimum of 150 NFL points may judge. If you are a non-member of the
National Forensics League and feel you have a student who is qualified to judge, please
email [email protected] and explain what makes you think your student is
qualified to judge. The tab and tournament directors will review this and we will send
approval or denial within 48 hours.
BALLOTS AND AWARDS:
Awards will be given to all competitors reaching the final round of competition. In Lincoln Douglas
Debate and Public Forum Debate, the competitors ranked 3-6, but not in the final round will also
receive an award. In Congressional Debate, the top six competitors will receive awards. Please pick
them up during the awards ceremony, or arrange to have someone else do so on your behalf. No
ballots will be given out until the awards ceremony has been completed.
REGISTRATION:
All registration will be conducted online at http://www.speechwire.com. We cannot accept email or
phone registration, but are happy to help you navigate the registration website. If there are any
questions concerning registration, please contact [email protected].
HOTELS:
The official tournament accommodation is still be contracted and will be announced as soon as
possible.
FEES:
$15.00
$7.00
$40.00
$15.00
$20.00
Event entry fee per student per event
Judge meal (automatically calculated into your fee sheet)
Hired judge fee
Drop fee per student after registration closes
Drop fee per student for hidden drops
LUNCH:
Students will be provided with lunch. Meal options will be posted on the registration website.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
CLOSED CAMPUS:
This is a closed campus. This means that once registration has closed no contestant, judge, or coach
affiliated with the tournament, may leave the Lake Mary Preparatory School campus. Any student
that leaves, will immediately be considered disqualified. Any judge, who leaves campus, will
immediately be dismissed from the tournament. A coach will have to reduce their number of entries
if this judge cannot immediately be replaced. Any coach acting as the official school representative
who leaves prior to the conclusion of awards will have their entire team disqualified and will not be
invited to future Griffin Growl tournaments. Campus will reopen at the conclusion of the awards
ceremony.
SAFETY:
In the case of medical emergency, please call 911. The tab room phone number is (561) 313-1443.
Please make all your judges aware of this number, so they can contact Tab in case of a problem. This
number is for on-site issues only, and will not be answered except during the tournament.
The policy of the Griffin Growl Novice Invitational concerning consumption of alcoholic beverages
by minors, illegal use of controlled substances, vandalism, and destructive, and other illegal or
disorderly behavior shall be: (1) to disqualify involved contestants from further competition, (2) to
communicate the offending incident to the contestants on-site guardians and/or parents, (3) to insist
on the contestant’s immediate transportation home, (4) to require financial reimbursement for all
damages or liabilities caused directly or indirectly by the indecent, and (5) to notify the legal
authorities. The precise remedy or remedies selected shall remain with the discretion of the Griffin
Growl. The Griffin Growl, its directors, staff and anyone associated with it are not legally
responsible and may not be held liable for the actions of any student, coach or judge involved in the
tournament.
ADULTED SUPERVISION AND INDEPENDENT ENTRIES:
Please remember that a school-approved adult must accompany students to the tournament and
remain on site for the entire competition. If the school-approved adult is NOT the coach of record
on the membership card, a letter signed by the school principal and printed on school stationary
MUST be presented at registration. The letter needs to specifically name the adult in charge. The
penalty for failing to bring this letter when it is required is disqualification of all contestants from the
school involved. This is non-negotiable.
The 4th Annual Griffin Growl Novice Invitational
Lake Mary Preparatory School
REGISTRATION SUPERVISION AND INDEPENDENT ENTRIES:
Monday, February 24, 2014
Online Registration Begins at
http://www.speechwire.com
Friday, March 21, 2014
Friday, March 28, 2014
4:00 pm
Saturday, April 5, 2014
7:30-8:00 am
Congress Legislation Posted
New entries due in all events (or as events hit
their caps)
Registration fees and judge burdens are
frozen
Onsite Check-in and payment.
Call-in registration is encouraged for all of our
out of town guests. (561) 313-1443